Saga Star Wars Philosophy: Jedi and Sith

The Sith sought violence as a solution.

 

No; they saw power as a solution, not violence. They look upon irrational violence as stupidy. They actually didn't work using violence but treachery and betrayal. Maybe subtle cunningness is a better term.

 

I think that even the power is a means to an end, and that end is absolute control. Seems to me that those most susceptible to the dark side are overwhelmed by fear and frustrated by the fact that they are limited in their ability to dispose of that fear. If you control something you need not fear it. If you control everything, you need fear nothing.

 

I think Sith philosophy is different for basically every Sith, but every Sith has the same goal: they want power.

 

Ermmm yeah....except that Sidious has created, or at least extended the scope and energy of, the corruption. He is feeding the egos of individuals in order to have them bend to his will, which is war and terror. I just don't think this idea that the Sith (especially Sidious) think of themselves as good is borne out at all by the story we are told. I don't think Sidious considers the concept 'good' to have any meaning, I don't think it has any relevance to him at all.

In short, it seems a bit daft to try and tell me (asa viewer) that Sidious objects to all the corruption when he is behind 99% of it - and it has all been leading to one goal - his power.

In real short - this is meaningless guph.

 

Palpatine says to Anakin that good is considered to be a point of view, which in the inverse means that evil is a point of view as well. This is borne out when Anakin and Obi-wan have their exchange towards the end of the duel on Mustafar.

OBI-WAN: "Anakin, Chancellor Palpatine is evil!"

ANAKIN: "From my point of view, the Jedi are evil."

As to the corruption that Palpatine caused, there is no doubt that he didn't cause it. But it existed long before he did anything. All he did was exploit it so that he could eliminate his enemies and take control of the Republic as an Empire.

 

Considering Palpatine's the culmination of 1000 years of Sith - doesn't seem all that implausible that they could have been working to make the Senate a little more corrupt with every generation.

 

The Jedi always confused me especially when watching ROTJ. In one of the near ending scenes, when Darth Vader is going against Luke, he tells Luke to join the Dark Side, and when he refuses, Vader says that he could easily turn his sister to the Dark Side. Luke then blows up in anger and repeatedly strikes Vader. In the scene before the fight, The Emperor was attempting to seduce Luke to the Dark Side by letting him release his hatred and anger. Anyone care to explain this philosophy?

 

Are you asking about the Sith or the Jedi or both?
The darkside is a quicker path, giving the user access to greater power if they let themselves be ruled by their passion, hence The Emperor encouraging Luke to start on the path of hate and anger, which would ultimately consume Luke and leave him a slave to the darkside. Luke resists giving in to this up to this point, but finally the weight of the situation the Rebels are in (he thinks they will die), and Vader prying the information on Leia out of his mind and threatening to turn her pushes him over the edge. He comes close to killing Vader in his rage, but then (looking at his and his father's robotic hands) makes a realisation that Vader was once like him, and striking him down in cold blood would bring him past the point of no return and put him on the dark path (ie, like Anakin killing Dooku in ROTS implies he has effectively replaced Dooku). Hence he defiantly throws away his saber and renounces the darkside, referencing himself as a Jedi like his father once was. I'm not sure if this answers your question...

 

Passion isn't wholly 'evil'. I don't buy this the Jedi are good the Sith are evil mentality.

 

I don't think it was ever stated that it was.

 

Yet it's often how people that state the Sith are act.

 

I always remember that scene. And I always remember that Luke would have killed Vader if Palpatine had not reacted with glee to the conflict between father and son before it could end.

 

Yeah, that is how I read it as well, kinda forgot to mention it. In his overconfidence he really emphasises what killing Vader would mean, and ironically brings Luke back down to reality. Some intended poetic justice I'm sure, he still thinks he is living in the period of the Jedi's demise.

 

Passion and emotion can be positive traits in a regular person. But when attempting to manipulate the Force, it can be dangerous.

 

I think the difference should lie in the motivations and approaches of the Jedi and Sith. However, going by the films, particularly the PT there really isn't that much of a difference between them. For me the Sith are more accurate because at least they don't deny passion and emotion exist. They both seem to have a major arrogance issue and they both vilify the other. Jedi almost seem isolationist whereas Sith seem interested in gaining power yet that of it's self isn't bad. Wanting to grow and become better is a pretty natural state of being. I don't think either faction had sound motives but I empathise most with Dooku because as far as I read him he desired *change* from a stagnant Republic. That I agree with.

 

'Good is a point of view' does not equate to 'I believe I am good'. In fact it renounces any usefulness or legitimacy to the idea of being good. In other words, Palpatine does not argue that the Jedi are not good, but that the Sith are, he simply nullifies the concept as having any grounding.

Anakin's later line is just a horribly pat, meaningless bit of throwaway dialogue; at best it could be viewed as underlining how naive Anakin is (not having grasped Palpatine's point at all). To see it as having any deeper meaning (ie that Anakin really does view the Jedi as evil) would require a) that we be given some cogent reason to understand this philosophical gestalt shift in Anakin's thinking and b) (and perhaps more damagingly) it flies in the face of what Lucas tells us Anakin is going through - ie the tears on Mustafar, Anakin knowing that what he is doing is wrong etc.

 

Passion isn't specifically love. Passion an intense feeling of emotion for something. In this case, the intense feeling is to use their negative emotions to intensify their connection to the Force and thus have the power to do anything. Anakin's passion was his obsessive desire to cheat death, because he was afraid to be alone in the universe. He surrenders to it and turns to the dark side as a result. This is explained in the Sith Code.

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken
The Force shall free me.

The opposite of this is the Jedi Code.

There is no emotion, there is peace.
There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.
There is no passion, there is serenity.
There is no chaos, there is harmony.
There is no death, there is the Force.

As to buying it, the Jedi have never once tried to subjugate entire systems. Countless worlds. An entire government. Those who did were no longer Jedi, but Sith.

No, he doesn't indicate that the Jedi are or aren't good. Anakin says that the Jedi use their power for the good of the galaxy, to which he points out the point of view. Palpatine also states that the Jedi and Sith are similar in almost every way.

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Right, he knows what he is doing is wrong. But the angrier and more hateful he becomes, the more he changes from the good man he was into the villain that we know. That's why he goes from tears of regret to outright hatred and contempt. It is his turn to the dark side. His journey ends with the knowledge that he killed Padme and his imprisonment in the suit. ​

 

Lots of people like to say that the Jedi code is overrated for you cannot love. I recently rewatched ROTS, and this is not true. Anakkin goes to Yoda in search for help about his dreams of his wife's death. Yoda asks if it is someone close, and Anikkan reveals that it is. Yoda gives advice on this, but does not say not to love, but that one must be careful with things like that for they may lead to the Darkside. I guess that Jedi can love others around them, it are expected to not mourn over the loss, but instead be happy they have transcended to be a part of the Force. In the end of ROTS, Obi-Wan says he's disappointed in what his friend had become, and that he'd loved him. Does this make him a bad Jedi? Of course not, a Jedi is able to love and care, as long as he/she is willing to lose this person.

 

Problem being that this is more the "unconditional love for all life" thing Anakin mentions in AoTC.

It seemed pretty clear from his and Padme's discussions in both AoTC and RoTS that any kind of long term attachment, like marriage - is an expel-worthy offense.

 

"The Jedi are trained to let go. They're trained from birth," he continues, "They're not supposed to form attachments. They can love people- in fact, they should love everybody. They should love their enemies; they should love the Sith. But they can't form attachments. So what all these movies are about is: greed. Greed is a source of pain and suffering for everybody. And the ultimate state of greed is the desire to cheat death."

--George Lucas, The Making Of Revenge Of The Sith; page 213

"It's about a good boy who was loving and had exceptional powers, but how that eventually corrupted him and how he confused possessive love with compassionate love. That happens in Episode II: Regardless of how his mother died, Jedis are not supposed to take vengeance. And that's why they say he was too old to be a Jedi, because he made his emotional connections. His undoing is that he loveth too much."

--George Lucas, Rolling Stone Magazine Interview; June 2005.

 

Letting go of attachments is not as easy as it sounds. And judging from the Jedi's attempts to maintain the Order in face of the turmoils in the movie - regardless of whether we're talking about the Order's efforts to maintain their position with the Republic, or Obi-Wan and Yoda's efforts to ensure that Luke will renew the Order - I would say that they haven't exactly learned their lesson.

Detaching their members from family and other personal ties did not really serve the Jedi's agenda in teaching them to let go. By recruiting acolytes at such an early age, the Jedi teachers only guaranteed that their members would end up becoming attached to the Order. The actions of major Jedi characters only verified this.

Letting go of attachments was not enough. Learning "when" to let go of attachments was a lesson that the Jedi failed to teach. And I cannot help but wonder if Lucas ever realized this.

 

Exactly. That's one of the reasons their Order fell. It's part of the story.

 

He did, that was the point of Anakin and Luke's journey. Anakin didn't want to let go of Padme, which is why he became Vader. Luke learned to let go of Han and Leia, which is why he didn't turn.

 

I don't buy it. This theory sounds like an attempt to dump all of the flaws, mistakes and crimes on the Sith; when non-Sith characters are equally capable of doing the same.

I'm aware that letting go of attachments is the goal of the characters . . . especially the Jedi ones. But what the Saga and Lucas failed to consider is there is a point when a person has to realize when is the right time to let go of an attachment. Sometimes, a person can let go of an attachment at the wrong time. Consider this . . . what if Luke had decided to disregard his blood connection to Anakin/Vader and never made any attempt to appeal to his father?